Base year of People correlation diagram of ancient Greece

1. Base person

I used Theseus, the son of Aegeus, as a reference because I could identify the year of his ascension to the King of Athens and associated with many people of the time.

2. Theseus' reign years

The chronicler of the first century BC, Castor of Rhodes, tells of the reigns of successive Athenian kings and notes that in the 12th year reign of the 29th Athenian king Aeschylus, the first Olympiad was held in which Coroebus won the footrace. [1]

The first Olympiad in which Eris's Coroebus won a foot race is known to have been in 776 BC, and the year of Aeschylus's ascension is 787 BC. [2]

Counting backward from Aeschylus according to the length of his reign, Theseus's reign is 30 years, from 1239 BC to 1209 BC.

3. Theseus' age at accession

Aegeus, king of Athens, who was old and had no heir, summoned to Athens his son Theseus, who had been born to Aethra, the daughter of Pittheus of Troezen. [3]

Theseus was then sixteen years old. [4]

Deucalion, son of Minos, then married off his sister Phaedra to Theseus in order to make an alliance with Athens. [5]

This marriage seems to have happened when Minos was dead and Aegeus was still alive.

Theseus also had a son Hippolytus by Antiope, born before his marriage to Phaedra. [6]

Based on the above, it is estimated that Theseus was born in 1263 BC when Theseus ascended to the throne of Athens when he was 24 years old.

4. Hercules’s birth year

Theseus, then seven years old, is said to have seen Heracles sitting on a lion's skin when Heracles visited Pittheus, grandfather of Theseus. [7]

It is believed that this happened after Heracles defeated the Cithaeron’s lion at the age of 18, with an age difference of at least 11 years. [8]

Also, when Theseus was sixteen years old, the deeds of Heracles were widely known. [9]

Based on the above, I estimated that Heracles was born in 1275 BC, 12 years earlier than Theseus.

5. The year of the Argonauts and the Calydonian boar hunt

During the three years Heracles served under Lydia's Omphale, there was the Argonauts, the Calydonian boar hunt, and Theseus' exploits in the Isthmus of Corinth. [10]

Theseus' exploits on the Isthmus of Corinth, at the age of 16, are estimated at 1247 BC. [11]

Theseus also participates in the Argonauts from Troezen, and in the Calydonian boar hunt from Athens. [12]

Therefore, the Argo expedition dates to 1248 BC, and the Calydonian boar hunt to 1246 BC.

End